Webb-Martinez House

Duane's take

Here's the story as the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Down in Cameron County, there's a house with a name that carries two families in it, and that's no accident. The Webb-Martinez House has been standing since about 1906, when a man named Joseph Webb had it constructed for his family.

Now, Joseph Webb was born in 1850 and lived all the way to 1933, and in Brownsville, folks didn't call him Joseph. They called him Don Pepe. That tells you something right there about how a man can earn a name that fits him better than the one on his birth record.

Don Pepe served as clerk of Cameron County for thirty-four years. Thirty-four years of keeping the county's records straight, tending to the paperwork that holds a place together. He knew where everything was.

That's not a small thing. Then came 1929, and Don Pepe conveyed the house to one of his daughters, Josephine Webb. Josephine was a teacher in Brownsville, and she left enough of a mark on that community that a local school was later named for her.

Think about that. A teacher whose name gets put on a building where children learn to read and write and figure out the world. That's a kind of permanence.

But the story of the house doesn't stop with Josephine. Another daughter, Maria, and her husband Jose Martinez, their family has kept the home in the Webb line all along. Continuous ownership, the marker says, maintained right down through the descendants.

Two names on one house, and every generation that's held onto it has held onto something more than just the deed.

What the marker says

Joseph Webb (1850-1933) had this residence constructed for his family about 1906. Known as Don "Pepe", Webb served as clerk of Cameron County for 34 years. In 1929 he conveyed the house to a daughter, Josephine Webb, a Brownsville teacher for whom a local school was later named. Continuous ownership of the home by Webb's descendants has been maintained by the family of his daughter Maria and her husband Jose Martinez. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1981